


The living, the dead, and the ones who came back

by Kaylathebookworm



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Blood and Gore, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pandemics, References to Illness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-12 22:07:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28517655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaylathebookworm/pseuds/Kaylathebookworm
Summary: The world is falling apart. A pandemic is ravaging the globe, and people are dying. But the dead aren't staying that way. They're coming back. Desperate to survive, RWBY and JNPR band together, hoping to outlast the end. After all, in the darkest of times, hope is sometimes all we have left.
Kudos: 12





	1. Weiss

**Author's Note:**

> Some of this may be reminiscent of the current global situation. Please don't read this if it triggers you!

The virus seemed to spread across the globe in an instant, but in reality, it took several months. It was devastating everywhere, but some countries were worse than others. As people became ill, as they started to die, some places were more sensible, and people actually kept away from one another, stopping the virus from spreading. In the U.S., the federal government had no widespread policies that encouraged actions like staying inside and away from other people, and rules varied from state to state. It resulted in a lot of people continuing to live their lives just as they had before, and the virus wasn’t hindered in the slightest. Rent still needed to be paid, people still needed income. So they went to work. When the choice was between becoming homeless or risking the possibility of catching a virus, for many, it wasn’t a choice at all.

The most bizarre trend was the people who refused to even consider the fact that the virus was an active danger. They insisted that it was their right to interact with other people, that they couldn’t be told what to do by the government, which, in many cases, did nothing to enforce rules that would keep people safe from the virus.

The people in charge were only out to protect themselves, and didn’t give a damn about everyone else. As things got worse, they sequestered themselves in their mansions, using their wealth and influence to protect themselves while the common folk succumbed to sickness and death.

But when the dead didn’t stay that way, there was no one to protect the rich and powerful. They found out that their castles were made of nothing but sand, that their power was entirely dependent on people to have power over. That when everything fell apart, and they were to blame, no one would protect them. When money lost it’s value, everyone was on equal footing. Their lives were worth no more than those of anyone else.

Weiss wasn’t nearly as scared of the zombies as she was the mob that was breaking down her door. As it turns out, the rich and powerful, those who had all the control in the Old World, well; people weren’t too pleased with them. People had been dying in droves, suffering, while the wealthy like Jacques Schnee had hidden away in their finery. Suffice it to say, those who hadn’t died from the virus had come to take their revenge. A group had gathered at the front doors of the mansion, screaming obscenities about how their loved ones were dying, how some had started to  _ come back _ , how so many people had become homeless, had lost their lives, their families, their jobs; all while the Schnees had continued living in the lap of luxury. 

Well- it certainly appeared as though their time of peace was about to be over.

Weiss screamed as a brick was thrown through her bedroom window. She had been hiding there, door locked, tucked into a closet and hoping that the angry people wouldn’t find her.  _ She _ certainly wasn’t to blame for her father’s policies, for his wealth. She hadn’t had anything to do with the situation all of these people were stuck in, but it certainly seemed as though she was about to pay for it.

They were screaming, and banging down the front door. Her house was covered in graffiti, and she was pretty sure that some of the family cars had been lit on fire. Weiss had never been so afraid in her life. At least her sister wasn’t here. And Weiss didn’t think her father was, either. She was pretty sure it was just her, her mother, and her little brother Whitley, along with some servants, like Klein. 

They needed to get out of here, but there were so many angry people, and she couldn’t think straight over the pounding of her heart and the shaking of her hands. She was going to die here, today, if she didn’t  _ move _ . They would find her, or burn the whole house down, and she wouldn’t make it. She wasn’t ready to die.

Weiss pushed herself to her feet, trembling. She grabbed a suitcase, and stuffed it with extra clothes. Gingerly, she unlocked the door, hoping that no one had made it inside yet, that she wasn’t about to make a huge mistake. 

She sighed a breath of relief when she saw no one in the hall outside her room. She crept through the hallways, regretting her choice of heels as they clicked against the floor. She had to get out of here. She  _ had _ to. 

Klein had showed her a secret passage hidden in the library once, so she headed towards it. If she had any luck, she would be long gone by the time the mob had figured it out, or, hopefully, they never would. Weiss hesitated as she passed in front of Whitley’s door. It would be faster, easier if she ran on her own, but she wasn’t sure she could just leave him. Weiss might be the air to her father’s company, but she doubted an angry mob would spare her brother.

She knocked on his door after a short deliberation. There was no noise on the other side. “Whitley? It’s me! It’s Weiss,” she called in a whisper through his door.

The door cracked open, and she saw Whitley’s face peering through the doorway. He looked as terrified as Weiss felt.

“C’mon! We have to get out of here,” she demanded, pushing the door open further. 

“No!” he cried. “I-I’m sure that Father will come for us. He wouldn’t just leave us like this!”

“Whitley!  _ Father _ is on a business trip in Europe. He’s not coming for us. Have you seen Mother anywhere? There’s a secret back entrance through a hidden passage in the library. Klein showed it to me once. We can escape through there.”

“We can’t just  _ leave _ ,” Whitley stammard. 

Weiss almost sobbed in frustration. “We have no choice! These people are here for Father, but they won’t spare us. They want us dead! I’m not asking again. Let’s. Go. Grab a bag. I’m going to go get Mother, and I will be back  _ very  _ soon. These people will break in in no time, and we have to  _ go _ .”

Weiss ran as fast as she could to her mother’s room. She knocked on the door, hard, and shouted, “Mother! It’s Weiss! We have to go!”

Her mother opened the door far too slowly and blinked at Weiss, confused. “Weiss, sweetheart, why did you come here?”

Weiss’ eyes strayed to the bottle in her mother’s hand and she barely restrained a scream. “Mother, we have to go. There are people breaking down our front door. They’re going to kill us. Please! Let’s go!”

“I-,” her mother’s eyes were glassy, unfocused. “I don’t think I will go with you. This world is burning, and there’s nothing there for me in the ashes. I’ve lived my whole life here, and these people can’t make me leave.”

“What?” Weiss yelled. “That’s insane! Come! On!”

“Weiss, sweetie. There’s a pandemic, people are dying. And some people have started to come back. Your father left us, so did your sister. It’s just us. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life running. Take your brother and go. I’m going to stay here. Maybe they’ll find me, maybe they won’t. I’m done.” Finishing her sentence, her mother took a swig out of her bottle of vodka. She turned and saw Weiss still standing there, and sat down on her bed. “I told you. Go.”

“Mother! What are you doing? You don’t have to stay and die!” Weiss shouted at her.

“I’m dead either way. No one is making it out of this alive. Take your brother and get out of here. I’m ready to die, but you shouldn’t be. So go.”

Tears burned in Weiss’ eyes, but she couldn’t stand here all day and wait for her mother to change her mind. She had to get herself and Whitley out before they all died at the hands of an angry mob. She turned and ran back towards Whitley.

She had just reached his room again when she heard a loud  _ crack _ . The door, the barricades had finally broken. She grabbed Whitley’s hand and  _ ran _ towards the library. She wouldn’t let them die here. She couldn’t. 

Weiss knew that there were tears running down her face, and she heard Whitley panting, struggling to keep up with her pace, but she ignored it all. They had to get to the library. To the passage.

They reached the library, and she could hear the sounds of things breaking, of her family home being ransacked. The sounds of destruction were growing louder, closer. Weiss fumbled with a few different books, forgetting which one activated the passageway. She finally found it, and pulled Whitley into the staircase as a group of desperate, scared people approached the entrance to the library. She heard angry shouts as she slammed the door shut behind them, and she and Whitley ran down the stairs, ran from the house, and ran into the trees, not stopping until she was sure no one would find them.


	2. Ruby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, I am writing a lot about the current global problems. So if that is triggering for you, please don't read!  
> I do get more into the actual zombies towards the end of the chapter, though. It should be more like a traditional zombie apocalypse fic from there on out. Enjoy!

Ruby had been naive. She hadn’t really thought that she would see a global disaster in her lifetime. It had all seemed so far away. It couldn’t happen to her, right?

_ Wrong _ .

Her dad had gotten sick from working at Signal Academy. He knew he was sick, so he stayed away from his family, and told them to take care of Zwei. They didn’t even get to say goodbye. He was gone so fast.

Yang had held her while they both sobbed. They didn’t know what to do next, didn’t have any idea how to survive in this world alone. 

Their thoughts, though, were torn so easily from their grief, when the news spread that the virus wasn’t a normal virus. Somehow, it stopped spreading. And somehow, the dead rose up.

Those that had passed away got back up, and they came for the living. The people who were bitten by the Undead, they became them. They didn’t live much longer, and they died. Then, they, too, joined the masses of corpses.

It was a horrifying sight to watch footage on the news of bodies breaking out of a mass grave. They started towards the grave diggers, the newscasters. Watching the news, it gave everyone the sense that they would be next.

“Yang,” Ruby asked, “what do we do?”

Her sister looked just as lost as Ruby felt. “I don’t know,” she whispered.

“Everything is falling apart,” Ruby said, tears forming in her eyes, “the hospitals are wrecked, all the doctors and nurses, all the schools, it’s just… I never thought I would live to see the end.” 

“So Dad is just… one of those  _ things _ now?” Yang asked her, staring at the floor in horror.

“I hope not,” Ruby squeezed her eyes tight, wishing that she could block out the world, erase the nightmare that they were living in.

She found herself laughing, despite herself, as Zwei launched himself at her and Yang, joining their hug at top speeds. “Thanks, buddy,” she whispered to him. “I don’t know what we would do without you.”

She didn’t know what they would do even  _ with _ Zwei. The undead, these  _ zombies _ were just… roaming the streets. The hospitals were destroyed, members of government had gone into hiding, and no one knew what to do. No one knew how to stop these creatures that were once people, no one knew what to do now that everything was collapsing. People had started looting, desperate to provide what they could for themselves and their families. It made sense, though. No one would be working while zombies were out and about, and could turn you into one of them. Yeah, people needed to eat, but store owners were shutting their doors in fear. 

There were just so many. The virus had spread at lightning speeds, and hundreds of thousands had been infected. And they were all zombies, now. So many had died in healthcare facilities, so many doctors and medical professionals had been bitten, and had succumbed. People in nursing homes, too.

Everything was grinding to a halt in a way that it hadn’t before, not even at the height of the pandemic, before whatever nightmare mutation had turned it into whatever this was. Everyone was barricading in their homes, or trying to flee the country. So many people were trying to get into Mexico and Canada, lines of vehicles stretched for miles at the borders.

Things just kept getting worse. People were dying in droves, and infections kept rising as people attempted to keep living their lives, despite the fact that zombies were roaming the streets. And besides, people needed to eat, to get water.

Ruby really started to panic when their electricity shut off. It seemed that the electrical grid was failing, as there was no longer anyone around to maintain it. Everyone was either fleeing, in hiding, or dead. All of the food in their refrigerator spoiled, and the hot water was no longer working.

Yang swore as she shut the fridge door. “Crap! I wish we had gotten a generator. Well, all of this is no good. We’re probably going to need to go out soon and try to raid a grocery store. We might be able to see if we can find a generator somewhere.”

“Wait,” said Ruby, “is buying things no longer an option?”

Yang scoffed. “Do you really think anybody is working the cash registers? I’m hoping that there’s still food there, because I doubt that anyone is still doing deliveries. I’m also hoping that we won’t run into any zombies.”

“Well, this is a pretty small town, and the hospital isn’t all that close. I can’t imagine that a whole lot of the undead would be hanging around here. It’s a good thing that we aren’t in a city! And oh! We can always use those baseball bats that we have in the garage if we run into any,” Ruby said, tapping her fingers against her thigh. “We just have to try not to get bit! We can do this.”

Yang grinned at her. “You’re right! We’ve got this. I’ve survived my whole life up until now, and I have no intention of getting killed by a bunch of the undead. We’ve got them beat in both brains and brawn. There’s no way that we’ll run into any trouble.”

Ruby pumped her arm in the air. “Alright! Time to go get changed into combat gear for our first ever mission.”

Ruby and Yang ran to their respective rooms and grabbed clothes that would allow for more flexibility. Ruby changed into a black and red dress and a red cape, and grabbed a huge backpack and a tote bag to carry supplies in.

Yang grabbed her own bag, and put on her favorite pair of brown shorts, an orange sports bra, and threw on a jacket over the top. She grabbed her own bag and two baseball bats from the garage and met Ruby back in the kitchen.

Yang burst into laughter upon seeing Ruby. “ _ What _ are you  _ wearing _ ? Is that a  _ dress _ ?”

“Hey!” Ruby protested. “It’s a  _ combat skirt _ ! And it makes me look cool!”

“Are you kidding? It looks like you stepped out of ‘My Immortal’,” Yang grinned. “But if you think you can fight off zombies in that, then fine, let’s do this.” 

Ruby stuck her tongue out at her older sister. “I will be fine! To the grocery store and also probably the hardware store we go! Let’s take our bikes!”

“Better idea: let’s take Bumblebee,” Yang countered.

“No way! Do you have a continuous source of fuel for that thing? It’s not like the gas stations are still operating! We should save it and take our bikes since it’s not that long of a distance.”

“Fine,” Yang groaned. “But if I lose all feeling in my legs I blame you.”

Ruby flicked Yang’s shoulder. “You’ll be fine you big baby. Follow me!” She walked out and got on her bike. “Actually, wait, I don’t know how to get there. I’ll follow you!”

Yang rolled her eyes and started pedaling, Ruby not far behind.

*******

By the time they reached the grocery store, Ruby was seriously regretting her decision to take their bikes. The muscles in her legs were ached, and her whole body shook from the effort. Bikes were  _ definitely _ not designed for traveling uphill.

She felt her face fall when her eyes landed on the store. The front door was smashed in, and several of the windows were broken. Carts were scattered all over the place in front of the store, and an eerie silence was settled over it. She shared a glance with Yang, and saw the same uneasy look there that she was sure was present on her own face.

Ruby pulled a mask over her face, in the event that they contacted dust, or worse, zombies. Could you catch the sickness by breathing zombie fumes? She wasn’t sure, but she didn’t want to risk it. She noticed Yang doing the same thing, and they exchanged a tense nod.

Ruby got off of her bike and entered the building first, baseball bat over her shoulder, ready to strike. She picked her way through the broken glass in the entrance and winced at the noise it made under her boots. 

She could feel panic building in her chest.  _ What if there were other people here? What if they attacked? What if there were zombies? Was she about to get them killed?  _ Ruby took a breath, and let the feeling of the mask on her skin ground her. She could do this. She just had to focus on the task ahead. They needed food- non perishables. She crept towards the aisle with pasta and rice, looking around every corner for enemies, Yang at her back.

She groaned when they got to the middle of the aisle. It was completely ransacked. There was nothing left. Everyone else must have had the same idea as they did, just earlier. All of the non perishable foods were completely cleared out. 

Not seeing any activity, she and Yang split up, and went down different aisles. There was  _ nothing _ . Ruby barely restrained from screaming, if only so she wouldn’t attract any potential unwanted attention. The only place she found anything left was in the refrigerated aisle, but she winced when she tried opening one of the fridges. The power had been cut out here, too, and everything reeked. It was all spoiled.

She almost jumped when her foot something, and found herself smiling as she bent to pick it up. It was a bag of marshmallows! It wasn’t anything nutritious, and wouldn’t get them anywhere, but at least it was something. She threw it in her bag and kept moving. There were a couple of things in the vegetable and fruit aisles, all mushy and not preferable for consumption, but Ruby grabbed them anyway. Usually she wouldn’t be caught dead eating mushy blueberries and wilted lettuce, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

Ruby met back up with Yang towards the front of the store. “Find anything?” she asked, not expecting much.

Yang flicked her bangs out of her face. “Almost nothing. It won’t get us through the week.

Ruby sighed. “Me too. At least we didn’t see any zombies, right?”

But of course, she spoke too soon.

She and Yang walked back towards their bikes, not looking forward to the terrible ride ahead, when she heard  _ something _ . It sounded like someone dragging their feet against the pavement, and she looked up towards the sound, her heart rate spiking.

Not even ten feet from their bikes, there was a walking corpse. 

It was the most disgusting thing she had ever seen, and Ruby found herself pushing down the urge to vomit. It was slumped over, walking slowly, mouth hanging open. It’s skin was too pale to be human, and it looked like death incarnate. The thing was filthy, its clothes ripped, its hair matted where it wasn’t falling out, and it looked like it was in the first stages of decay. It’s fingers were blackening, and so were the ears and nose. 

The worst part was the  _ smell _ . It smelled like that time that a rat had gotten stuck in their attack and died in the middle of summer.

They had to get to their bikes, but Ruby felt herself instinctively cringing away at the  _ wrongness _ of it all. But she couldn’t let one lousy zombie stop her. She shared another glance with Yang, and they ran forward in tandem, bats raised. Yang let out a battle cry, and slammed her bat into the thing’s face while Ruby went for the torso.

The thing broke apart in an explosion of  _ disgusting _ , and Ruby almost cried. There was blood everywhere, and as they kept hitting it, the thing opened up from the torso and guts went flying. It went down, and Ruby took off toward her bike, Yang right behind her. Ruby took their bats and threw them in her extra bag, and they pedaled away as fast as their legs could take them, neither girl wanting to stay around and wait for more of those creatures.

It felt like no time at all had passed when they pulled into their driveway, and Ruby immediately jumped off and puked into the bushes.

“Holy shit,” Yang said, bent over, panting.

Ruby launched herself into her sister in a hug, feeling her whole body shake. Yang squeezed her, and let out a hysterical laugh.

“If we never do that again, it’ll have been too soon,” Ruby said, voice shaking with the rest of her. “But I think we both need a shower now.”

“You’re right,” Yang laughed, holding her soiled shirt away from her. “But hey, we made it. And I know we can make it through all of this. Let’s go inside.”


	3. Blake

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: cults, reference to abusive partners, gore

Blake Belladonna was in the middle of escaping from a cult when the whole world went to hell.

It’s not like she had  _ intended _ to join a cult, not that anyone ever does. She had been… young, and Adam had seemed brilliant, with his ideas of justice and revolution and remaking the whole world into an anarchist utopia. She had joined him, and they had moved to a farm far off the grid, where they stockpiled weapons and gathered a following. They were going to change the world.

That was, until it became clear that Adam wanted to rule this new world. He wanted a reality where he was a dictator, and he wanted power over others. And he wanted the world to bleed for all the pain it had caused him.

Blake could understand revenge, but as much as she hated the politicians who had hurt people of color, like her, and really any minority, she didn’t really want to execute every politician. The world had bled it’s fair share, and the kind of violence that Adam started talking about… it wouldn’t really make it any better. There had to be ways to make the world a better place without spilling an ocean of blood, right?

But Blake had spent years with the White Fang, she had become an expert at living off of the land, and she had mastered several types of guns. After five years, though, she realized that Adam was a monster, and she couldn’t help create the world he envisioned. She had started to understand how  _ isolated _ she was with the Fang, and how weird the whole thing was. She hadn’t had any contact with her family, and the entire group seemed to worship Adam. On top of all of the rest, he had started to look at her like a predator looked at prey, and every time she was with him, she had the feeling he was waiting to pounce. It was devolving into something that Blake wanted no part in, and she realized that she had to run.

So she did. In the middle of the night, she grabbed a bag, filled it with food, weapons, and clothing, and she ran. The White Fang farm was in the middle of nowhere, and they were surrounded by forests, in a sparsely populated area of Montana. Blake knew that they would expect her to take the only road out, which was dozens of miles long, and led pretty much nowhere else. If she took that route, she could be easily followed.

Terrified of being found, of being dragged back, she took to the woods, running as fast as she could in the dead of night, lit only by a flashlight. It was Summer, and the mosquitos were biting her to death, but she just kept running, tripping over roots and getting hit by branches in the way. If she stopped, she was certain she would be found, and brought back. Every time she began to slow, she thought about how Adam had started to look at her, and she ran faster, not wanting to find out what would happen if they found her.

Blake was immeasurably thankful that the land was somewhat flat, that she wasn’t running up and down giant hills on top of avoiding trees and rocks. She needed to save her energy as long as possible, and flat ground helped. Eventually, though, she became too tired to keep running, which she was only willing to admit to herself when she tripped over a large rock and fell to the forest floor, her legs giving out beneath her when she tried to stand. Her lungs burned so much she could barely breathe at all, and she laid there panting for what felt like hours. At that point, she crawled to a space beneath a tree, and covered herself with a sweatshirt that she had thrown in her bag, using the bag itself as a pillow. She slept fitfully, uncomfortable on the hard ground but completely exhausted, the two states of being warring but eventually allowing her to doze off.

When she awoke, the sun was creeping into the sky and every part of her body ached. Her legs didn’t want to support her weight, but she was sure she would be found if she stayed where she was. Blake grabbed a granola bottle and some water from her bag, trying to conserve her supply, but chugging way more water than she should have. Sighing, she pushed herself to her feet, brain foggy and slightly aching from the lack of sleep. Despite how much she wanted to lay back down on the ground and never get up, Blake forced herself to keep walking. Based on the position of the sun, she headed southeast, which was the direction she had been fairly certain she was heading in.

She hoped that she would hit civilization sometime soon, but she had no clue how far out the farm was in this direction from any towns. Ideally, she would come across a road at some point, and then she could follow it to a town, or maybe even a city. But for now, she was trudging through the forest, regretting every decision that had brought her to this point. Most teenage girls went to school, made friends and took classes like normal people.  _ Blake _ had joined a cult and run away from home, thinking that this older boy could save the world and single-handedly end systemic problems. And now she was trudging through the woods in the middle of who-knew-where, with no one to rely on.

At this point, she was walking along, feet barely responding to her commands to keep moving. The adrenaline from last night had mostly worn off, enough so that she didn’t have the strength to keep running, but was still followed by a sense of unease. 

Blake was honestly somewhat apprehensive. She hadn’t interacted with the rest of the world in years, and had no idea what it was like. Had anything changed? The farm hadn’t had any access to electronics like TVs or computers or the internet, because Adam said that those things ‘rot the mind’ and ‘influence people’. Of course,  _ Adam _ had been allowed to access those things, but he didn’t want his followers corrupted by mainstream media, and he said that the world was full of liars and cheats, who did everything in their power to hurt others.

If she had had access to the internet, maybe Blake would have seen the red flags sooner.

As it was, Blake was stuck walking through miles and miles of forest, cursing the mosquitos. She really should have brought bug spray, but her planning had been minimal at best. Most of her planning had been on deliberating whether or not to leave in the first place, and it was a bit of a gut decision to do it. It was terrifying, leaving behind all she had known for years, and going off on her own in the middle of the wilderness, but it had really started to seem like the better option.

Blake sighed as she glanced up at the sun, considerably higher in the sky than it had been when she woke up. She was pretty sure that there was civilization in this general direction, that there were cities and towns in the vicinity. There was no way she wasn’t getting close. She pulled another granola bar from her bag, slumping against a tree for a break.

Sure, she  _ could _ survive in the wilderness, and she  _ could _ probably survive out here, but she really didn’t want to. In all honesty, she didn’t want to be alone. She missed her family, she missed having a normal life. Living in the middle of the woods was not how she wanted to spend the rest of her life. She wanted to go to college, and to try to make the rest of the world a better place. Being perpetually alone would not help further any of her goals, which, honestly were pretty recent developments. Until recently, she had been convinced that the Fang was her life, that she could never leave, that she would die in a violent blaze of glory taking down the old world and instating a better one. It had been a long time since she had had real dreams, but she wasn’t going to give up on them now. Blake was determined to hold on to the thought of a normal life with everything she had.

It was nearing dark, and she still hadn’t found a town or any sign of people, so Blake resigned herself to another night spent in the woods. She grabbed another granola bar and more water, making a face at them. It had only been two days, but she was really getting sick of granola bars, and her body was begging her for actual food.  _ Soon _ , she told herself,  _ I’ll be able to find a restaurant _ . She could really go for a burger. She hadn’t had fast food in ages, and she had never loved it, but something about escaping from a terrorist group made her crave normalcy. It was everything that Adam hated, and processed food sounded amazing. Well, except for granola bars. Those could all go to hell.

This time she attempted to make an actual bed for herself, finding a patch of moss to lay in, and covering herself with leaves. Her sweatshirt still ended up being more of an effective blanket, but it only covered part of her, so the leaves would be her helpers. Annoyed, she squashed the mosquito that was buzzing by her ear, and flicked a spider off of her. After all of this time on a farm and in the outdoors, she had gotten used to bugs, but she still hated mosquito bites, and wasn’t a huge fan of being crawled on. On the bright side, bugs meant that it was warm out. She really wouldn’t want to be doing this in the dead of winter, because then she would probably freeze to death. So she let out a breath, and tried to be thankful for life’s little annoyances as she drifted off, body craving sleep.

Waking up, again, Blake found herself wishing she were anywhere else. A bed would be nice, and she would love to not be alone in the middle of the woods. It was kind of terrifying, that feeling of being lost, of wandering in the middle of nowhere, and a small part of her was getting worried that she would never see another person again. Trying hard to ignore that voice of uncertainty in the back of her mind, Blake readied herself for another day of walking. 

This time would be better. Today, she was sure she could find a sign of humanity. She was sure of it. Her feet dragged in the general direction of  _ south _ , and she felt herself wanting to groan with each step.  _ I can do this _ , she reminded herself, a repeating mantra in her head. She refused to die here, in the middle of nowhere. She would not succumb to exhaustion, she refused to die at the age of 17. Her life was not going to suck forever, and she would not be wandering in the forest for all of eternity. Things would be better, they had to be.

Blake couldn’t have been walking for more than an hour when she stumbled upon a clearing. She looked up and she almost cried. There was a  _ road. _ A  _ highway _ , even. She could hitchhike! Or just walk along it, because eventually she would come across an exit, and there would be people! She wasn’t stuck in the woods forever! Honestly, she couldn’t remember the last time she was so relieved. This route appeared to be going East to West, so she started walking in the Westward direction. It was really nice to be on an actual flat surface, to not have to stumble over roots and avoid trees. The asphalt was a really nice change of pace, and her aching legs were so thankful.

It took a while, but she started to feel… eerie. Something felt wrong, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.

There were no cars on the road.

There was nothing. Not a one. Sure, there weren’t a whole lot of people in the middle of Montana, driving along the highway in the middle of the day, but she should have seen  _ something _ by this point. She had been on the road at least an hour, and hadn’t seen a single car. Her hands started to shake, and a knot formed in her stomach. 

“I’m sure it’s fine,” she said to a nearby squirrel, trying to settle the anxiety that was building in her. “There’s probably a perfectly reasonable explanation for the lack of cars. Nothing’s wrong. I’m just in the middle of nowhere, that’s it!”

Blake hadn’t grabbed any guns, worried that it would have been too suspicious, that she would have made too much noise, but she did have two switchblades in her bag. She pulled one out, and put it in her pocket, within easy reach. Just in case. 

It would be fine.

Hours, and at least ten miles later, she came across the bright red of a gas station. She sighed with relief. There would be people there! 

Blake halted, though, at the long line of cars surrounding each of the gas station terminals. The cars spilled out onto the highway, and onto the grass surrounding the station. Creeping closer, she peered inside some of the cars. There was no one in any of the vehicles. Something was  _ wrong _ . Blake had never driven before, but she remembered gas stations, and they weren’t generally surrounded by abandoned cars.

Pulling out her knife, she headed towards the attached convenience store, apprehension building. A small part of her held onto the hope that someone would be there, that they could tell her what was wrong. Maybe there had just been a gas shortage? She was really hoping that was it. She honestly couldn’t think of a reason that so many people would abandon their cars at a gas station.

The doors to the convenience store were smashed, and so were some of the windows. Stepping inside, the whole place was completely trashed, and there was next to nothing left on the shelves. Now she was starting to get really nervous.

“Hello?” she called quietly, not sure whether she wanted a response or not.

No one responded verbally, but she heard a faint sound coming from the corner of the store. It was probably an animal of some sort, but it wouldn’t hurt to check. Slowly, trying not to spook whatever it was, Blake crept through the aisles and towards the back corner. “Is anyone there?” she whispered, really hoping that she wasn’t about to encounter a rabid animal.

She gasped when she saw… the  _ thing _ . It didn’t appear to be a rabid animal, but it looked an awful lot like a rabid  _ person _ . 

It was definitely a person, of some kind, but they looked incredibly ill. If she didn’t know better, Blake would think that they were already dead. She had never seen a living person who looked like a decaying corpse before, but their skin was mottled in colors that skin wasn’t supposed to be, and the person had chunks of hair and skin falling out. But they were standing, so that had to account for something… right?

“Um, excuse me, are you alright? I think we should get you to a hospital,” Blake said, coming up to the person, hand raised in what she hoped could be considered a comforting gesture. She cursed, realizing that she didn’t have a way to contact emergency services.

The person groaned, an inhuman sound, and reached out towards her hand. Blake cringed, but resisted the urge to pull away. This poor person obviously needed her help.

At least, that was what she  _ thought _ , until the creature lunged at her, with far too much strength and speed for a dying person, snapping its jaws, the way one does when they’re trying to bite.

Blake had never been so thankful for her combat training. She ripped her hand away from the thing and jumped back, holding up her knife.

“Oh  _ fuck _ ,” she shouted, “how the hell did you contract  _ rabies _ ?”

She couldn’t help this person. Once an organism had rabies, if not immediately treated, then they were going to die. This might as well have been a corpse in front of her. 

Gulping, Blake kicked her foot at the thing, and jumped back again, tipping over a rack onto it. She cringed at the noise, but she didn’t particularly want to stick around. Ensuring it was trapped, she turned and ran, out of the store, and in the opposite direction she had come. There was no one around, no one in sight, and Blake didn’t stop sprinting until the gas station was nothing but a speck in the distance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not going to lie, I was really excited for this chapter, and I'm pretty pumped to write more!


End file.
